Frosty Eyes
by Hattiakourri
Summary: A strange cat walks into Bulma and Vegeta's lives-- and mysterious circumstances arise...
1. Time

3/9/09: Another edit. I went through to fix some errors… these chapters were written exactly one year ago, and I've only barely started touching them this week… so, I "rushed" them into "publication," and there were some silly little mistakes. Tell me if you see any, and I'll hop right on them.

**Disclaimer: I do not own DBZ. If I did, I would have my hand latched on Vegeta's ass the whole time.**

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Frosty Eyes

_It was only a sunny smile,_

_And little it cost in the giving._

_But like the morning light,_

_It scattered the night_

_And made the day worth living._

_-Anonymous_

**Chapter One: Time**

The bushes, their leaves tinged with pearly moonlight, rustled briefly in the twilight hours as a whisper of wind caressed the leaves. The sunlight was dying at the early hour of seven, setting somberly behind the building in anticipation of the encroaching winter, spilling soft light over the trees and the landscape. The dying lights that were struggling to leap the building coated the world in an ennui that few could escape.

The Gravity Room stood alone in the gloom of sunset, its metal shell growing increasingly colder and darker, bathed in the shadow of the tree that stood alone beside it, just as far away from life as the person who lingered inside.

Up in the branches, the tree's only occupant stretched its legs as it lazed in the branches with languid contentment. The dim lights struck his eyes and turned them a spangled gold, which twinkled with dark undertones that glittered with wisdom. The beautiful eyes stayed fixed on the occupant of the Room, trained on the movement beyond the red glass. They tracked the movement of the person inside with ease, pondering about the intentions of the person inside, and contemplating their motives.

The door of the metal ship opened suddenly, startling him, as he scrambled up the branches, eager to avoid the attention (and ire) of his ward. Feeling sufficiently shrouded by the dark leaves of the peach tree; he flopped bonelessly over onto another branch, and resumed his pensive watch over the Prince.

__________________________________________________________________

The Prince in question wandered over to his Peach tree (He had claimed it as his own) curiously, having caught the ghost of a scent that was unfamiliar to him. He knew something was up there, for he heard the noise of something picking around in the leaves, scuttling around with the barest hint a sound. His smoky eyes searched the leaves and the hollows for his quarry, scanning for the most subtle movements, but after a minute determined that whatever was in that tree was utterly harmless, and headed inside for dinner.

His watchful eyes witnessed him wander away, and once Vegeta entered the building, leapt from the security of the dark branches to the ground. He fought his way indoors, deftly leaping through a door that lingered open too long, whipping around corners, and making his way to the stairs with an uncanny prowess born of shadowy skill. The runners slowed his progress up the stairs, loose fabric snagging his feet and causing him to stumble on several occasions as he ascended the stairs, intent on reaching his destination.

After a long journey, he entered the storage room, leaping on crates and boxes and old equipment, in an effort to reach the air vent, and despite his short arms and legs, reached the metal alcove. Clambering in clumsily, he softly crawled over to his destination, a room that was somewhat dark and scented heavily by the scent of Bunny's night-blooming jasmine. With a solid thump, he jumped on the vent, and knocked it loose long enough to allow his stocky body passage, before the magnet grabbed it again and pulled it shut with a snap, landing roughly on a bed with black covers.

A bed that smelled of the feral prince.

He lay on the pillow, which smelled so strongly of the scent of Vegeta's hair, and let it lull him to sleep.

________________________________________________________________________

"Honey, do you want some of the pork roast?"

Before the sentence had time to leave her mouth, he had deftly picked up his silver fork and knife and cut into it, the extraordinarily giant pig threatening to sate his monstrous appetite. The supple, moist flesh called to the Saiyan Prince's appetite like a siren's call, begging him to whet his appetite with the tender white meat. He was _**starving.**_

The dinner, though it had just begun, had been quiet, the very air between him and his blue-headed housemate thrumming with tension. She shot glares over the table at him, her cerulean eyes almost screaming at him, blazing with her own brand of arrogance and daring. Her parents ignored the juvenile behavior.

_Pig._

_Rat bastard._

He stared back in kind, his smoldering black eyes drilling into her own like a sharp bit into blue steel.

_Blue-headed Bitch._

The poor doctor and his gentle wife were caught in the middle of the raging tempest, aware of the eerie quiet. The doctor was speechless and just concentrated on finishing his meal so he would have a perfect excuse to leave. His wife, however, fully intended to be the family peacemaker, and offered dessert to break the ice.

"Would anybody be interested in some chocolate cake for dessert? She cheerily asked. The query hovered in the air for a moment until her angry daughter snapped out of her repose and looked at her.

"…What? Oh… yes, mom… that would be very nice…"

With Vegeta, however, she was not as lucky. He stared at his plate with a brooding temper, searing heat throbbing and pounding at his temples, promising a headache no medicine would remedy. The ghost of a sigh danced on his lips, and though it was extremely quiet, everyone heard. He stood up and left quickly, not looking at anybody in the room as he did so.

The rest of the family sat speechless, staring at his empty chair, and the lonely dinner plate that sat in front of it.

It hadn't even been touched...

The moody prince was lost to his thoughts as he ascended the stairs, his thoughts screaming in a zephyr of anger and discontent. His mind, his body, and even his very soul ached at its core, making him feel old, weak, and very, very tired. When he crossed his threshold, he closed the door softly and locked the deadbolt quietly, turning towards his bed and collapsing with a poignant sigh upon the surface. He rolled over to turn off his bedside lamp, and he found the ceramic surface icy cold to his touch. He watched as his breath misted miserably in the chilly air…

He curled up tightly and cocooned himself within the chilled sheets and blankets, feeling tired, jaded, and aching to the bone. He shut his eyes, trying in vain to find the rest that had eluded him for so long. He thought himself negligent as he began to drift off to that tired, sleepy little vale, and was surprised that he did not mind the presence of a warm, fuzzy, pillow on his bed.

As he was pulled down into the misty seas of slumber, all he could think about was a certain dragon, and the damn wish that he granted.

Hell, they should have just left him dead…

Even in his waking hours, when his bleary eyes still burnt with restless sleep, he could find innumerable things that he did not like about his new life. The sunlight, bright and cheery, glared wickedly in his eyes, bouncing off their smooth glassy surfaces, lancing painfully into his brain. He looked into the light for a bare second, wishing the goddamn Chikyuu-jin sun into oblivion, before he deferred, lowering his eyes to concentrate upon the face of a sleepy cat, curled up into a furry ball and napping contentedly within his strong arms.

"Where the hell did you come from, fuzzbutt?" He winced at the crackle that tainted his rusty baritone. He could not remember seeing this cat, and he knew it wasn't Dr. Briefs'. _That_ fleabag_—Scratch--_ was coal black and howled like an Ionian fire-tempest. He hated that cat.

This cat's only response to his gruff inquiry was to snuggle into the Prince's neck, causing His Majesty to acquiesce to the cat's silent pleading. He lay back in the small, cold bed and stared belatedly at the old grandfather clock that occupied the distant wall, noting that he had overslept by an hour or so, and that time was wasting away.

Moreover, he was just sitting there with his ass planted in his bed…

His mind was screaming at him to get up, but his body remained strangely leaden as he stared at the ceiling. It was nit-picking at him, pinching at his pride, and hurling names at him like a feeble child.

_Lazy bones,_ it called him. _Get off your ass and give a damn,_ it nagged.

He forced his body up with Herculean effort, and prepared himself to endure his famous displays of masochism and neglect.

_That's getting kind of hard,_ he thought morosely as he stalked towards his prison and his sanctuary.

She dragged her fork lazily through her dessert, the metal prongs tearing the spongy cake and trailing it through the raspberry syrup, taking little interest in doing anything other than drawing pictures and writing names in her dessert. After the quietly disastrous scene at the table earlier, her sweet tooth seemed to have rotted and fallen out. Before she knew it, she had found herself alone in the kitchen, save for her fretting mother, who was absently scrubbing dishes, uncharacteristically silent.

"What's wrong, mom?" the blue-haired maiden asked, noting her mother's strange behavior. "You're scrubbing that casserole dish so hard, you're going to scrub your skin off…"

She put the dish down and dropped the scouring pad in the sink, rubbed her cheek, and pressed her fingers against her forehead.

"Honey…I'm sorry," she apologized, turning to her only daughter. "Things are not going well around here…" she trailed off, taking a seat beside Bulma, and lapsing into silence.

After a minute, Bunny eyed her only child shrewdly. "You know, I remember a time when we were simpler, before we had all this money…when I used to bake chocolate chip cookies in our little kitchen…when your father worked out of our garage… when you stumbled around in my garden chasing butterflies…" she ran her hand through Bulma's hair, as tears glistened in her eyes. " I know you don't remember all of that, because you were so young. There are days I wish we were still like that, because with all of this money… it just isn't the same. Now… well, you're all grown up now. We live in a palace that's fit for kings, your papa's retired, you're taking over the company, and…" she stared into her daughter's eyes, her own sparkling with an intense maternal love.

_You have a beautiful boy who loves you, _she thought.

"…and…?"

"…and I just want to see you happy! Don't be so _caustic_." Bunny finished, picking the used dishes off the table and sliding them into the sink. "Don't feel like you have to be at war with him…"

"What are you talking about?!"

"…You know what I mean, honey. You're a smart, intelligent woman. It's your own business so I won't pry. I won't bother you any more about it—"

The blue-haired vixen pounced on her mother as soon as the words left her mouth. "You said "_**him**_." "Who's _**him**_?" she paused a minute before she realized who the "boy" in question was—

"_**Vegeta?! **_Mother! Oh, that is just _sick_! Completely twisted!"

Bunny shrugged as she returned to her dishes, a gossamer bubble floating from the foamy soap drawing her attention to the window where she saw the ghost of a reflection of their male houseguest.

"I'm just suggesting what I see, dear. There's no need to be militant about it…"

_Don't say something you might regret dear… I beg you._

Her latent anger exploded. "Mother… I can't stand the guy. There's no heart in him, no soul… He's got to be the universe's biggest bigot. He's just a cold-blooded, arrogant, smart-ass bastard whose only purpose in life is to kill my best friend! After he realizes that he can't do it, he'll probably hang himself because he doesn't have a life or a friend to speak of…"

Bunny's eyes flashed in fear as she wrung her towel. She could practically see the flames spurting out of her only daughter's mouth, as she saw the approach of the man in question. She gestured to the door, but was blatantly ignored when Bulma continued to rave.

"What was that, mother?"

"I think what you should be asking…" rang a rusty baritone from the doorway, sending electric shocks racing down her spine and chilling the blood in her veins, "is what_ I_ thought about that whole tirade, but you don't need to fill me in. After all, since _I'm_ the bastard, I should know…"

Bulma whipped around and was faced with a pair of startlingly harsh and beautiful smoky eyes drilling into her own like twin bits through steel.

"Let me make this _crystal clear_ to you, woman. I don't give a shit about your opinion of me. I honestly couldn't care less about your opinion of my personal life. If, somehow, you've got it into that withered, shrunken little skull," his face contracted in the most sinister of grimaces, "that you can somehow_ hurt _me with that little tirade, you're wrong."

He gripped her chin gently, though his savage gaze possessed hers fully. His gaze was magnetic, compelling.

"…So you can take your ideas and criticism, and stick them up you own ass, because I'm pretty damn sure nobody else wants to hear it." Even as he released her chin and backed up, his eyes still remained possessive of her own. After what seems like a miserable eternity, he turned to leave the room to attempt to salvage something out of his miserable day, when he remembered to give her a piece of advice, for future reference.

"Oh, and _Bulma_," he said her name with a scalding, seething tone, "you might want to pull your head out of there. There might not be enough room."

Her mother stayed silent as she furiously scrubbed at the dishes, to alleviate her discomfort as her daughters cheeks reddened with eyes, wide as saucers, could only stare absently at the spot that the wicked little troll had formerly occupied, her crimson blush, slowly darkening into rage.

"Why, that sorry little shit," she sputtered in absolute fury, readying to pursue when the blonde's snatched her arm deftly and looked at her with a look of pure empathy, a look absolutely foreign on her normally vacant features.

"Don't follow him, dear," she warned sternly. Tears could be heard quivering in her voice as she amended, "You might not like what you'll see. Give him time sweet-"

Bulma tore her arm from her mother's grasp, and fled from the room, like fire on her heels, as Bunny sat alone at the table, wringing her towel between her shaking hands, and quivering with nerves.

"That's all you can do right now…"

Bulma stomped up the staircase noisily, her thoughts drowning in a pit of despair and confusion that seemed to swallow her like heavy water. _Damn it… _she moaned to herself. _Damn that man. Damn that man to hell!_

_Damn me…_

After the fallout in the kitchen, his hunger had retreated back into the dark maw that was his stomach. He clicked his door shut, and stared at his strange companion in the eyes. He felt the life leaking out of his burning, stinging eyes, and flopped back on the squeaky old bed with a belated sigh.

_There'll be no training today…_

The cat meowed contentedly and glanced toward the window absently, and Vegeta's gaze followed the feline's.

_Well, there's always the window._

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Hours later, he found himself kissing the ceramic floor of the simulator, his arms cut, bruised, bleeding, and refusing, for all the steely strength in them, to lift himself up. Scratches stung and burned on his legs, bruises of various shades mottled his skin, and he was loath to get up.

His violent and brutal anger burned brightly behind his eyes and seared his brain, and like always, is indomitable pride forced him back up on his feet.

It was his pride that forced him to live.

It was his pride that spoke for him.

It was his pride that kept him his only company.

Pride was all he had.

As he reached for the first-aid kit in the simulator's console, he belatedly realized, _pride really __**was**__ all he had._

And he didn't have much left.

His hollow of a heart sunk further into a puddle of nothing, as he bandaged up his bleeding wrist and began his sojourn inside, hoping to find something to assuage the ache of the gaping hole inside him.

…but that hole was something that not even an ungodly amount of food would fill…

_Damn…_

_Damn…_

_Damn… _

She punched her soft blue micro-bead pillow while muttering all the curses she knew, lamenting her carelessness and stupidity. She _had _recently found some common ground with him, but she knew, deep in her heart of hearts, that she had blown it all to hell with her vocal buckshot.

She muffled her curses and self-loathing as she once again buried her burning face into her pillow and pummeled away, twisting her fist in its squishy grip, knowing that if her blue Peep Chick pillow were alive, it would be screaming at the torture…

_You need to apologize,_ her stormy mind whispered.

Hell no! That wasn't an option. After all, she did have her own pride to keep…

_Still, you need to apologize._

She sighed with a grimace, because she knew that her traitor of a mind was right. She stood up on her tired legs, knowing that she may or may not regret what she was about to do, but ha to do it nonetheless. She bolted out the door in a brisk walk, tense with anxiety, to the first place she would think to find her quarry: the gravity simulator. She was astonished when she found the torture chamber (as she called the room on occasion) empty, save for the presence of an overturned first-aid kit, and what seemed to be a single drop of blood on the floor.

"I'm not your maid, Vegeta," she hissed under her breath as she whirled around to descend upon her next destination, the kitchen. Opening the fridge on a hunch and finding it bare, her suspicions were confirmed and she knew that she was hot on the trail of the prince… and needed to buy groceries. She was going to have words with him, come hell or high water…

He had reached the landing on the top of the stairs, and immediately realized the absence of a presence that he had reluctantly grown to accept…

The cat was gone.

Deciding that it was no big loss, he strolled over to the bed. As he flopped down on the bed's creaky, squeaky spring mattress, he vaguely noticed that the back of his head seemed to tingle and tickle.

_…huh. That's odd._

________________________________________________________________________._

The cat sat upon it's flowerpot perch on the balcony, staring intently at the feral prince, and mulled to himself as he often did, but was soon jerked rudely back into complete consciousness when the Tempest herself came barging loudly up the stairs, toward the room of His charge. Seeing the zephyr of hell that threatened to erupt within the small space, he glared with the utmost concentration at the prince, willing him, no, hoping for him to do something…

*Thump.*

Bulma opened the door and bumped it into the limp body on the floor. She knew almost immediately that something was amiss.

"Shit," she swore as she attempted to roll Vegeta's unnaturally heavy self over, to keep him from drowning in his spit, or from choking on his tongue. He was breathing, she certainly could see that much, but his eyes fluttered wildly beneath the paper-thin lids as if he were seeing a god in all of its holy, immortal glory. His fingers twitched spasmodically, his chest hitched madly, and his toes curled horribly and inhumanly.

He writhed and thrashed on the carpeted floor, and strange, choked moans tore themselves loose from his throat, the noise burying itself into the core of Bulma's memory. In his savage throes, his eyes flew open for her to see, charcoal rings around dark irises contracted into thin, brittle metal haloes around dark pits—

Dark pits that normally swallowed souls whole, that right now, seemed terribly shallow….

Sparkling golden eyes measured up the commotion inside, glittering in platinum streaks from the silky moonlight shining above. He watched through the beveled glass window as His Majesty's spasms eased with a morbid amusement, the great gaping maw in his own eyes shrinking down into a comparable pinhole. He turned his gaze away from the scene and looked up at the stars that winked and twinkled in the velvet blanket above.

Things were going to get interesting.

________________________________________________________________________

Don't worry if everything's not clicking yet. Remember, it's only the first date!

*~* Hattiakourri*~*


	2. Sickness

Thanks to my lonely little reviewer, Lhia.

**Disclaimer:** Need I say it? If I owned Dragonball Z, I wouldn't be writing _**fanfiction**_, would I?

Frosty Eyes

Chapter Two: Sickness

The first sight that greeted him when his eyelids peeled open was a pair of dazzling blue eyes. His mind, thick and clouded with sleep and confusion, wondered idly at their beauty, and thought about great blue oceans, dancing and rippling gently…

Tranquil waters lapping at the shores…

"…"

A bottomless pit of crystal clear water, cold as ice, and dark as night…

"--geta--"

Floating on the waves alone, dragging his fingers lovingly through the water…

"Veg--!"

Smooth, wet sand slipping between his fingers, and cool ivory shells in his grip…

"Vegeta!!!"

Oh, hell. It was just the woman.

"What the hell do you want, you crab? I was asleep. I'd expect you to have the decency to leave me be, but I suppose that would be too much for you to consider, wouldn't it?" he snarled irritably.

She applauded slowly, and in a manner that completely lacked any flattery. "Well, good for you, then. I suppose I should just leave you be. But that would make you too happy, and I just live to annoy you!"

"Well then, why don't you get your skinny little ass out of my-"

"Do you even know why you were asleep?"

"Right now, I don't give a shit. You're avoiding my command. It was _NOT_ a request. Leave!"

"You just had a Grand Mal seizure, that's what. So, as much as I'm loathing the task of actually _touching_ you, I need to get you down to the med bay."

"Liar woman, I don't have seizures."

"Tell that to my dad," she mumbled blandly, attempting in vain to pull him to his feet. "Come on, help me out here."

"No."

She looked him, closer than it seemed that she had ever done, and noticed something new about him.

Right now, he looked like shit.

"You feel really bad, don't you?"

"Shut up, woman, and get your deed done."

_I'll take that as a yes._

She was staring at the readouts on the EEG, and listened to the furious scratching of the little needle, as it sketched out the Saiyan's brain wave patterns on the paper. Bulma and her father had concluded that his readout was normal, and found that he was not having any lasting effects.

Even so, he was behaving like an irate vagrant with hemorrhoids--which was usual for him--but was really _not helping_. He reached up and plucked the sensors from his forehead, and flung the wires to the floor, blatantly ignoring the EEG machine, which was braying loudly at being disconnected from its host, insisting that he had suddenly become brain-dead.

"—Don't need this, Woman!"

"Put it back on, Vegeta!"

"Hell no! I'm not one of your mindless lab rats! Would you believe me when I tell you I'm fine?"

"No! Vegeta, you would say "I'm fine" even if your leg had been blown off and you were bleeding out!" she hissed.

He shot her an incredulous look as he slumped back on the tissue paper-covered gurney with a huff. He crossed his arms and stared at the instruments on the far wall as the genius affixed the diodes back to his head.

"By the way," Bulma said as she tried to get the machine to cooperate, "What's been up with you lately?" The machine continued to whine until she took the rather "un-scientific" route and thwacked the metal casing with a shaking fist. "I'm just getting this weird vibe from you lately…"

"_What?_ What the hell are you talking about?" He asked incredulously. He was fairly comfortable with Earthling tongues, but the colloquialisms still eluded him from time to time. Was she asking about his welfare? More than that, why would she_ care_?

And what the hell was a "vibe?"

Irritated with his constant antagonism, she used her thumb to jab the suction sensor back to the Saiyan's head roughly. "Never mind. Just trying to make conversation."

"Well, don't. You are confusing enough when you're just trying to rip my throat out."

Bulma was awakened early in the morning by the hypnotic scent of bacon and eggs being whipped up into a fine assortment of dishes by her masterful chef mother. It was the perfect bait for the members of a hungry household.

When she finished her hours-long routine of primping and fixing her recently straightened hair, she flounced downstairs in high spirits, following her nose to the scent of food. She listened as the bacon fried, popped, and sizzled, and the craving for salty, greasy fried meat had never been so incredibly powerful. _Diet be damned,_ she thought triumphantly, preparing to set into the assortment like a predatory beast with an age-long hunger, when she reached the ground floor landing.

The table was laden with artistic and beautiful food: colorful omelettes spilling over with earthy mushrooms and brightly colored bell peppers, fresh, sizzling hot platters of sausages and bacon, stacks of piping hot buttermilk pancakes with rich butter and thick whipped cream and exotic tropical fruits galore… so much food…

Vegeta's dream come true, she thought with veiled amusement as the scent tickled her nostrils and roused her hunger. She heard her stomach growl with a petulant whine, and chuckled at the noise, reminding her of the animalistic feral roar of Vegeta's. It was a bass rumble that, the first time she heard it, sounded like distant thunder. Little did she know, her resident Saiyan was simply hungry…!

She returned to the present, roused from her thoughts by the singing and dancing of her eternally blissful mother. She realized that something seemed very different on this otherwise normal morning.

The sun was shining.

The birds were singing.

The clouds were puffy and cheery.

…Oh. How could she have failed to notice? Sir Stick-Up-His-Ass wasn't here to mess any of the perfection up.

_Come to think of it, _she thought, _where was he?_ The Dark Shadow was missing out on the beauty and the perfection of the day…

Oh, he could deal with it.

She took her time and ate her fill before she deigned to check up on her consistently irate houseguest. She opened the door extremely slowly, in fear that Vegeta had secretly raised a horde of insectoid aliens that would lunge for her throat the second she opened the door.

Nothing happened.

Not even an indignant yell. That was a surprise.

She poked her head into the Forbidden Chamber, and, blue eyes adjusting to the murky darkness, spied a figure twisted into the dark sheets.

She stole quietly to his side, peering over a smooth, bare shoulder, a bare snatch of sunlight racing over his silvery scars like lightning… over a sea of rippling abs, over a hauntingly handsome face, framed with gravity-defying raven-black hair…

…_With that lovely dusky skin, those perfect, exquisite bones beneath, those smooth, slightly bow-shaped lips, his long dark lashes, his purr-like breathing, his—_

Cat?

A furry head with beautiful spangled-golden eyes poked out of the soft black cotton duvet, fixing those domineering, slitted eyes solely upon her. She might have been a human, and it might have only been a mere cat, but she could swear that her skin felt hot and itched like wildfire under its silent gaze.

_I didn't know he had a cat,_ she wondered absently. _He sure never as hell never told me. But then again, when the hell does he ever tell me anything?_

Silence reigned masterfully between Vegeta's placid, purring snores, while Bulma stood there wondering when he had gotten it, or where it had come from.

A paw was lifted in the air, painfully slowly, and she did not pay it any mind until the cat suddenly yowled at the top of his lungs, bared several sharp yellowed claws, and sunk them into the sleeping princes' shoulder, jerking Vegeta savagely awake, and coaxing Bulma to shriek at the top of her own.

"ReeeeeeeeeEEEEOOOOOOWWW!"

"**Shit!"**

"Oh, crap," Bulma mewled, knowing that hell was about to descend on Earth. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"

"Wha—woman?!! What the hell—"

"Reeeeeeeeeeoooooowwwwww!"

"I didn't do anything, I swear!"

He shot her a withering glare as he ran a hand through his hair, trying to drive the drowsiness from his mind. "Damn cat…" he muttered as he inspected his arm for bloody scratches. They were minor, and instead of bolting off to the bathroom to stop the the hemorrhagic bleeding (as Bulma's wild imagination would have vividly depicted it) he pulled the covers back over his head, leaving only the hint of a spike of hair above the silky black duvet. He flipped over, giving her his back.

"Oh… Breakfast is downstairs, Vegeta."

"Fine."

"Well?!"

"Ask me nicely."

She huffed at his gall. "Won't you _grace_ us with the _joys_ of your mere _presence_, O _Illustrious Majesty_?" Her tone was sickeningly obsequious, false, saccharine, and completely disrespectful.

"Piss Off!" he roared, the snarl seemingly disembodied from under the covers.

"Fine. Have it your way. You can scavenge for all I care! I hear bugs are high in protein," she shot back, unruffled. She had gotten her head back again, and she was now the Cool Ice-Queen. Nothing would set her off now. No matter what he did or said, she would keep her cool. She would be on top.

"Sounds appetizing, but too bad I won't be down when you make dinner," he sneered when he flipped the covers back over his head. "You always serve them in ample supply." His gaze locked squarely with hers, his dark eyes flashing with irritation and amusement.

Her cheeks flamed and reddened with intense choler as her finely manicured nails bit into her soft, fleshy palms, coaxing forth velvety red blood. Her knuckles turned as white as a sheet and trembled like an itchy trigger finger, straining, no, fighting against itself, trying to bottle up the aggression that made the hard bones of her hand tremble with barely repressed violence.

_Well, so much for the "Cool Ice-Queen…"_

"Well, asshole, at least_ I_ can cook!"

"I beg to differ. Now, can you please get the hell out?"

"…"

_No. Don't you dare say it,_ she pleaded silently. _Don't say it. I'll have to deck you if you do, feeble human woman or not._

She winced as she saw his lips form the very phrase she was hoping he wouldn't utter.

"TODAY, GIRL."

That singular phrase made her blood boil and seethe. Being christened "woman" was bad enough, but when he got in certain moods, he would downgrade her from woman to mere "girl," which was absolutely unacceptable.

Her lips, pressed together into a bloodless line, seemed to quiver for a bare second before she ground out a reply through tightly clenched teeth. _**"Fine."**_

She slammed the door behind her so roughly, the door rattled in its hinges and framed, earning a last, muted grumble from the Saiyan sleepyhead.

"…dragon."

Dr. Briefs was puttering around in the kitchen, reading the newspaper and sipping at his coffee, bravely straight-black. He was particularly interested in the article about a technology convention being held downtown. He glanced away from his paper to pick up his coffee mug, and spotted his daughter stomping down the stairs.

"Oh, hello dear! How are—"

"**Shut your gob!"** Bulma roared as she passed by, storming into the kitchen. Her anger was palpable as she tore past her father, violence almost leaking from her pores.

"Oh Bulma, Good—" Mrs. Briefs' sunny morning greeting was rudely and viciously interrupted as the feral female grabbed the stacks of pancakes, and flung them, plates, syrup, butter and all, onto the floor.

"—Morning. Temper, temper," she attempted as her daughter left, as quickly and as enraged as she had come, like a frightening tornado. "Good Lord," she sighed as she plucked a shard of sticky white ceramic off of the floor. "That was the china."

Dr. Briefs shuffled in, a cigarette perched in his mouth and his black cat spread bonelessly on his shoulder. Confusion was evident in his wide eyes. "I thought that you thought that china was the ugliest set you'd ever seen."

"Of course I did, dear. Your parents gave it to us."

"You liked it?'

"It was expendable."

"Oh. Who did this?"

A scream came from the top of the stairs, bloodcurdling in its ferocity. They knew the voice by heart, but the feral roar still frightened them more than any corporeal threat in the universe…

"Oh. Her."

"Such a temper," she mused absently as she summoned the robots to clean the shattered, sticky mess off the floor. She found her bright eyes drifting towards the staircase, with someone else in mind. "She needs a boy like that, too..."

"Well, that's new."

The very air shimmered in an exotic heat haze, and the red caution lights glared, spewing forth from the alcoves and heat bulbs like a quiet, placid fire. His essence pooled in his bones, fortifying them like rods of steel. The gravity tugged on his body with a shocking, unending force, causing his muscles to shudder and buckle under the stress.

"Huh. That's odd," the Prince muttered to himself absently, evaluating his every move, his every breath, with the scrutiny of an analyst. "It wasn't that hard yesterday."

He used his latent anger to lash out in a savagely powerful mule kick and knuckleduster combo, and though the movements were usually effortless to him, he felt his muscles strain and complain. He reached down to pull up the waistband of his loose training shorts as he prepared to continue his arduous and grueling task, to slug it out and make himself proud, to inch himself that much closer to his ultimate, definitive goal…

_But it's hard to do that when you're performing this poorly…!_

Backlash. Reverse-thrust. Side-snap kick. Phoenix-fan technique. He flew through the moves as fast as he dared, watching his own poetic movement and drifting off into ruminative thought.

He was shocked to discover that his mind was not up to the task, and chastised himself as he returned to his basic kata, hoping that the motions would be fluid and meditative, and help him concentrate.

His concentration slipped was he worked his way through the movements, and noticed that now, even his eyes were turning against him, as the world before him warped and blurred in uncertainty. Sweat dripped off of his brow as his fingers trembled and shook.

He reached down to pull the waistband of his shorts up again, his chest hitching with his quick gasps.

"What?"

A light in the corner of the simulator flickered dimly and succinctly in the corner, shining and reflecting in his dark eyes. A jolt flew through the console like a ghost, setting the display in a most wicked red glow and sucking the gravity out of the room.

"What the hell…?" He re-entered all of the operation codes and pressed the engage button, but was greeted only by silence.

"No…no…"

He punched in the override codes, every single one he knew (and he knew many), with a manic urgency that was completely unlike him. _Beep. Beep. Beep. _

He even found himself praying to a god—any god—that nothing had just gone irreparably wrong.

"Ah, hell…"

The readout of the machine pleasantly informed him that the gravity simulation capabilities were operating at normal capacity, but whenever he pressed a button, the computer refused to respond.

"Oh, hell. I must have fried the circuits. Of all my rotten luck--"

The computer screen suddenly shifted into a different one, and a baby blue background materialized from the liquid crystal display with balloons of every color drifting happily and pleasantly up to the top of the screen. It displayed a single sentence.

**Simulation Timed Out.**

Vegeta was puzzled by this, but was prepared to get the woman or her father to come and fix the problem. However, just as he turned to fetch them, he caught a glimpse of a sudden change in the screen.

Again, it displayed only a single sentence.

**Have a nice day, Vegeta.**

…

…

No. It was worse than a short out.

It was the woman.

Next Time: Some people try to resume their social lives, and things just get weirder.

*~* Hattiakourri *~*


	3. Ruminations

You have found your way to installment #3 of Frosty Eyes. Come in, sit down, and enjoy.

I am happy that you guys seem to enjoy this fic… I checked into my email, and I read the reviews… and then I ran to my computer to finish polishing this baby. Sorry about the late update— It was my birthday, and I was wiped out—but it's up now. Enjoy!

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_**Now, to the list of my reviewers…**_

**Lhia**, **marcaiah1223**, and the wonderful **Lilac Owl**!

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Disclaimer: No, I don't own DBZ, because if I did, Vegeta would be my husband, Bulma be damned.

**~*~ Hattiakourri ~*~**

**Frosty Eyes**

Chapter Three: Ruminations

"Hey, babe…" a suggestive voice slithered smoothly out of the phone. "How would you like to spend the evening together? I know that it's been awhile since we did, and I heard that _that jackass_ over there has been making your life a living hell."

"Who spilled?"

"Oh… a little birdie told me…" Yamcha's voice trailed playfully.

"A bald, featherless bird with six dots on his forehead, no doubt," Bulma giggled, remembering Kuririn's last visit—Vegeta had hung around the entire time, always lurking in the room next door, practically hanging around their necks like an unrepentant vampire. No wonder he had come away with that kind of an opinion.

"Maybe," Yamcha continued jovially. "Anyway, would you like to go?"

"Oh, Yamcha, you know I'd love to, but—"

"Wait—before you say that, think about this. You. Need. A. Vacation. He sure calls himself a genius, so His Royal Sphincter should be able to put together a sandwich or die trying," he chuckled bitterly. "Emphasis on the dying part, of course. _Please_."

"Alright…"

"Great. See you at seven."

_He had been sent here from the deepest pits of Hell to slowly annoy me to death,_ she thought darkly. _And it's working._

And he had been, hadn't he? The instant he had barged into her room to demand an upgrade and found her dolling herself in front of her vanity, she knew that his witching hour had arrived, and that tonight, she was the prime target.

Bulma's features, bright and fresh without any hint of makeup, was flushed pink in indignant irritation. Her simple black halter cocktail dress clung to her shapely, lush figure like a glove, molding to her curves like a second skin. Her cerulean hair, shiny and soft, was mussed as she attempted to pull it up into a dignified bun. All of that, paired with the charming rosy tint high on her cheeks, made her absolutely irresistible to the gruff Saiyan, which he knowingly admitted to himself, despite her mulish tendencies.

"Do you mind?!" she snapped irritably, flashing her pearly white teeth, her azure eyes narrowed and sparkling with livid rage.

"Yes," he teased, snatching a billowy, soft kabuki brush out of Bulma's hands, patting the fluffy end of the brush. A cloud of silvery dust came out, eliciting a cough from the wicked little Saiyan Prince. "Damn, woman," he muttered, plastering an uncharacteristic grin on his face, wielding the brush like a magnifying glass. "You could be a detective with this thing…"

Was he trying to be… playful?

Whatever that was supposed to be, she wasn't biting. "Ha ha…funny. See me laughing?" she questioned, eyes ablaze, and voice completely devoid of humor. She stuck her hand out in a command. "Give it back."

"Why?" A look of laughter danced mirthfully in his eyes even while his mouth remained hard and emotionless, a look Bulma had not yet learned to decipher. To her, his eyes only seemed to display an unholy, wicked glee.

"Because, unlike you, I have a social life, and right now, I'm pressed for time…"

"Oh, no you're not. No one's made me dinner yet," he complained. "If I didn't know better, I'd think you were trying to starve me to death …" he trailed off, putting an odd look on his face that was quite comical, considering the source.

Bulma idly wondered if he was drunk.

"Don't get happy, I don't have that kind of luck," she muttered to herself. "Can't Mom do that for you? After all, she cooks better than I do…"

The look he shot her— one that obviously read "_no, REALLY?"—_pissed her off something fierce. "Perhaps, but that is hardly enough to make up for her inane _babbling_."

"Hey, be grateful, and don't knock it. For some reason, she actually likes you enough to do stuff for you."

"Of course she does," he snorted, bringing his hand to his chest, over his heart, proudly. "After all, who doesn't want to serve the Prince of All Saiyans?"

"Like that's the biggest favor in the world…" the feisty blue-haired beauty snorted as she held out her hand. "Now, can I have it back, '_O Gracious Majesty?'_ I have a date, and I'm going to be late. Trust me, I have better things to do than sit here with _you_…"

Vegeta simply stood there, brush in hand, his face having completely drained of mirth.

"Today, Vegeta."

His eyes narrowed in irritation, as he irritably chucked the brush at her mirror. "Do what you will." He clipped darkly, and stalked from the room as if fire were on his heels.

She watched slightly puzzled as he stalked from the room, his sudden anger palpable, tangible. _Did she say something?_ _What was wrong with __**him**__?_

_______________________________________________________________________

The hour of seven came inexorably and slowly, forcing all living souls to wallow in its eternity before its arrival.

-For Bulma Briefs, however, it could not end fast enough.

Her long-awaited date with her old flame was nearly as exciting as one, sputtering, flickering, and threatening at any moment to go out.

The very sky seemed to weep when she reached the restaurant, breaking out into a grim deluge by the time she arrived. The restaurant, a classy five-star seafood specialty kitchen located high in the picturesque jade hills north of Metro West, was currently shrouded in mist—a sign she should have interpreted as an omen, but it didn't bother her. Not even the fact that she had been soaked to the bone when she walked through the door had really dampened her surprisingly high and eager spirits—

But all of that changed when her date showed up half an hour late, and even when he did show up, he appeared to have left his brain at home, for he was acting, in her opinion, decidedly stupid.

He had ordered a wildly expensive dish of salmon-roe sushi and sashimi before realizing that he didn't care much for sushi, and that he had only ordered it to look sophisticated. He picked at the pricey dish, obviously unhappy with the fare he had chosen. As if that hadn't been enough…

Then he had decided to _speak_. Of all times, he had to pick _then_ to try to _speak._

She had ordered a plate of coldwater Maine Lobster tails, and she was salivating, prepared to tear into the moist, tender flesh, when poor Yamcha attempted conversation again.

"Hey… did you know that lobsters are kinda the cockroaches of the sea…?"

_Oh, thank you, Yamcha. A dazzling conversation._

"_Thank you, Mr. Suave…"_ the blue-haired beauty growled under her breath, setting down her fork. "Yamcha, I can't do this anymore."

Her scar-faced date looked at her quizzically, the dramatic lightning outside flashing along his smooth scars. 'What do you mean? What are you talking about, Bulma?"

The heiress shot him a look that screamed of fatigue. She was tired--oh boy, was she—in both mind and body. She was tired of sleepless nights, but most of all, she was tired of this farce of a relationship.

"I'm sorry. Tonight…" she paused, making an effort to remain poised and calm, "Tonight hasn't really gone that well."

_Understatement of the year._

"I'm sorry, hon…" he whined. "I'm sorry as sorry can be." He admitted in a sallow tone. "I had it all planned out perfectly, and then I just had to screw it up…!"

"No. It…it wasn't just you. I have the feeling that the both of us just weren't feeling up to this tonight, that's all."

"Oh," he sighed, wholly agreeing with her. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—" he stopped stammering when she raised her hand up.

"Don't do that. Stop apologizing, it's pathetic. It's okay, really." She looked at him then, drinking him in with her eyes, her deep, searching gaze coming up empty, at a loss. "We'll try again another day."

He beamed with genuine gratitude. "Thanks, babe. I owe you one. Really."

"It's okay. And don't call me 'babe.'"

She staggered through the door late at night, her hair mussed; her cheeks were flushed, and she was mentally prepared to enter a war zone. It was 11:50 at night, she was alone and miserable, and she was looking to take it out on the rest of the world—

--No. Not the whole world. There were billions of innocent people in the world who didn't deserve her ire. She could, however, take it out on the ONE alien prince that lived with HER and pissed her off beyond ALL REASON.

_Yep. He deserved it_, she thought wickedly, a feral grin forming on her face at the thought of an oncoming battle. She strode over the threshold of the doorway, imagining her gait as a lazy predator waltzing thought the house, looking for its next vulnerable victim. Pride oozed out of every thought in profuse amounts. _Come downstairs. I know you're up. Come berate me. I'll show you who's boss…_

She strode defiantly toward the stairs, to seek him out. _She would take the offensive,_ she mused, gripping the balustrade with white-knuckled hands that shook and trembled with anticipation. She took the first step—

And promptly went flying backwards to land awkwardly on her ass, her limbs in a bizarre tangle, eyes wide as saucers, and completely stupefied. As if in a daze, she cut a glance at her murderously high black heels and realized that the heel had broke off, and glided over near the couch, leaving her, in essence, walking up the stairs on the tip-toes, slightly tipsy, and uncoordinated.

No wonder she fell.

Vegeta had been lying placidly in his room, mulling over his thoughts when her heard the door downstairs open and close, accompanied by strange muttering, which was clear indication that the woman had come and gone. At the noise, his thoughts had turned to her.

That hadn't been much of a change—they had pretty much revolved around her the entire night, and he realized (with clear disdain) that he had to find a way to get around these involuntary thoughts, and they were not conducive to his training at all. It wasn't her that necessarily bothered him, it was the fact that she was everywhere in his mind at all hours of the day.

The cat stared at His Majesty on the bed with his lovely eyes, glittering the color of white gold. His tail had curled slightly at the sound of the door, and he had promptly bounced off of the squeaky old bed and out of the chilly room to head to the kitchen. Vegeta followed in pursuit, obeying the commands of his perpetual hunger.

The cat purred contentedly as his sandpaper tongue licked at a bowl of heavy cream, spiced with cinnamon. He looked up as Vegeta had started rooting through the fridge, rummaging though the crisper and pulling out a succulent white peach with chilly flesh. As he closed the door, he bit into his prize with a predatory grin.

When the thump rang through the kitchen, the cat shot to attention, whipping around the corner, eyes wide, bright, and filled with alarm. Vegeta was soon to follow, certain that the hollow sound of flesh hitting the ground must have been the woman, and that she probably did herself harm.

When he cleared the corner, he just saw her sitting at the base of the stairs, sprawled as gracelessly as a bow-legged stork, sitting up with a ramrod straight back, eyes wide and muttering to herself.

She turned and looked at him.

He stared back at her.

_Oh. She's just retarded, _he thought absently.

The silence was deafening.

He took another bite of the succulent peach, revealing the dark pit and the swollen fire-red flesh in its core, turned around, and went into the kitchen again without a word.

"Hey!" she hissed at her irritating houseguest, now present, in hopes of getting him to help her up. After waiting a short while, and hearing no response, she kicked off her shoes and stood up on her soft bare feet, giving chase into the kitchen. She hadn't been hurt, and hadn't really needed the help, but it irked her that he didn't even offer it. She could have been injured for all he knew!

She found him sitting at the table in his bedraggled bedclothes, staring out the beveled glass window, out into the night, his teeth still sunken into the flesh. His eyes reflected the stars, their lustre brilliant. She became lost in that dark sea, imagining the great Dark Horse rearing up out of the celestial clouds, seeing the Pleiades shining bright in their deep cobalt brilliance, the fire and passion of the Cat's Eye, reflected in that solitary gaze. _All those beautiful and wonderful things he must have seen out in space, and hadn't been able to share with anyone…_

All of that beauty trapped inside the inky black abysses that served as his eyes.

"Hello…" Bulma trailed off, waving her hand in front of his face, not drawing any comfort, cold or otherwise, from his distant gaze. He was contemplative, ruminating. Perhaps, she mused, a little cheerless. "Are you there? You look like you've seen a ghost…"

He snapped out of his reverie when he heard her voice carry over the lush emerald hills and deep lilac sky of his Vegetasei, echoing like a destructive ripple that flushed away the memories that had gathered around him like timid butterflies. A soft breeze turned violent as it whipped against his face, carrying images of his beloved past-- a past that was very distant and fleeting—away from him. The world around him, darker now than it had ever seemed in his remembrance, melted away into a cold black sky sprinkled with silver stars, into a dark marble kitchen soaked in midnight shade, and into a blue-haired woman who sat beside him.

_Ghosts indeed._

He felt empty.

"Vegeta? You okay?" She inquired. Her eyes seemed softer now, perhaps from strain, or tiredness. They caught the starlight in their glassy rims, like a pond glistening under a milky full moon.

They were pretty. Though he'd never said so, he'd never denied it. It was _her_, through and through, the one feature of her that prevailed in his memory, no matter where he went—he saw the lakes in the fresh green forests of Earth, and he thought of her. As he flew over the vast oceans, and witnessed the rippling, billowing currents below, he thought of her. Actually, now that he thought of it, she was in his head a lot.

It should have troubled him, but honestly, he couldn't care less. All he could think about was that she was here, and she was talking to _him_.

She wasn't talking _at_ him anymore. She wanted to hear what he had to say. And he appreciated that. He would tell her something at least, even if it wasn't the way he really felt.

He was freer now than he had ever been before, but he didn't think he'd ever open up _that_ much. That would leave his heart vulnerable—and that was something he'd _never _do. _Ever._

_He's off in space somewhere,_ she thought absently. _That's why he's not responding to a word I'm saying._

He glanced at her after a moment. His eyes were soft, dark charcoal irises rimmed with soft grey rings, and they glittered at her in the midnight hour with a hidden emotion she couldn't identify. His face was ivory white with the buttery moonglow, and the lines on his face had disappeared.

All and all, it was quite lovely to her.

Secretly, deep down beneath his icy sea of consciousness, he belatedly reciprocated that opinion.

"Vegeta, are you okay? I mean, you look like you're out to sea--"

He seemed to recover his wits as he shot her a glaring look. "What the hell are you talking about? _**I'm just fine**_."

"Okay, I'll take your word for it, _Captain Ahab_," she drawled out in a sullen growl. He wasn't listening to a damn word she was saying. "I'll think I'll just be _going_ up to _bed_, then, since _My Lord and Master_ doesn't seem to want me around…" She stood up woodenly and stomped up the stairs, her thoughts steeped in a dark, roiling brew. _Did you think something would happen? I thought you knew him better than that._ _Even if he did feel the same way about you that you *periodically* do for him, he wouldn't tell a soul, not even you. He's a three-lock box, and he will take his secrets with him to the grave._

_His soul was detached from his body tonight,_ he mused as he sat at the table, clutching his empty glass in hand. His eyes were drawn outside to see the cat sitting on the fencepost, its coppery fur glinting in the buttercream moonlight as it tried to snatch Luna moths dancing in the air. The feline's twinkling gold eyes locked with his suddenly, and spilled over with a luscious emerald green, speckled with white-hot embers. Vegeta's head lowered to the table, slowly drifting away to the drowsy vale of slumber.

All was silent.

For the longest time, all he saw was simply darkness. He would envision the fiercest war imaginable—great iron fires flourishing in twisting spires, boiling and eating at skyscrapers. Charred flesh churning in the air with boiling black smoke, clogging his throat and nose with their thick charnel smell. Ash and ember raining from the sky, mingling with the filthy rain. The sound of his ground troops in full armor, stomping over the remains of building and living being alike. _**Feeling the planet, withering and dying, shuddering and crying under his feet**_.Mother dearest. Where are you? _**Over there, sleeping with the dead…**_

He snapped out of his wicked reverie, his breath a hair quicker, feeling like his heart was in his throat and his ears were stuffed with cotton. Those memories swept in like shadowy rats, stealing into his conscious and snatching away his sanity one kernel at a time, leaving him lightheaded and unhinged. He was different now, he knew, but he couldn't surmise whether or not that was a good thing. Even worse, he wasn't sure that he liked what he now was.

He deserved no redemption. His soul had died on innumerable battlefields, lost in mere husks, peeling off like the skins of shells, one piece at a time along the way. What was left was merely a hole.

…

_She_ might be able to fill that space, but so would blood, so would muscle. So would formaldehyde. Bulma was nothing particularly special, in that regard.

…

But soon after that thought had made itself known, he envisioned her with her big blue eyes, the shimmering crystal seas drowning the flames, washing away the smear of smoke, flooding the scars of war, washing the bodies and the blood away from his hell. It was locked inside a prison of freezing water. He was drowning in there.

Oh, the confusion! What the hell did this all mean?

He saw the cat again, floating on the debris, above the surface of the water. That cat simply looked down at him. The look was indecipherable. Mystery prevailed as the visions drained from his mind like a sluice.

_**Why worry? You need your sleep.**_

Vegeta sank like a stone in the numbingly cold water, underneath his mind's astral starlight, watching placidly as the inky depths claimed him, and the feline remained safely floating on the surface, looking perfectly peaceful and serene in the night air. Drowsiness pulled him into a dreamless sleep.

He snapped sharply awake the next morning with the sun, and with the sensation of a gentle caress tingling in his pores. Someone had been there, he knew, watching over him as he slept. They had just left the room, and a trail of their scent behind them. He tested that essence, one that was undoubtedly the woman's, and almost let it lull him back to sleep, when the woman in question entered the room again with a pitcher of cold water, steeped with crisp lemon slices. He could feel the metallic coolness of the water, he could taste the tartness of the fresh lemon, he could feel the flush of cold water hit the back of his parched throat, even from across the room. His surreal senses sent shivers down his spine.

"You're up? You're _alive_?" she queried with genuine surprise. She had thought that, for awhile there, he was dead. She could admit now that she had feared the worst.

He had some explaining to do.

"_Yes_, you silly bitch. You can see that. Why am I here? Shouldn't I be in the kitchen with my face planted in the table? I remember falling asleep there…"

"**Shut up.** Just when were you planning on _telling_ me that you were an epileptic? That's important information…" she trailed off absently, thoughts whirling at a thousand miles per hour. "Especially when you couple that with your insomnia-"

His eyes shot open, and she knew he was cornered.

He erupted into a furious snarl, whirling on her with a poisonous glare. "That is none of your business! You have no right to pity me—not you, with your life of cotton candy and fantasies! Mind your own self-righteous business…"

_My 'life of cotton candy and fantasies?' What the hell was __**that **__supposed to mean?_

"I would, but I guess I think about you too much. Way more than is healthy, obviously. I won't make that mistake again, I assure you." She pivoted sharply on her heel and proceeded to leave the room, but halted before she disappeared from the doorway. "This is the last time I'm going to help you. You can stay here, but from now on, I don't want any reminder that you're alive. You're dead to me now."

She left the room, leaving nothing but disaster in her wake.

For some reason, in his dark dreams, all he could think of was a brambly rosebush, its proud green stalk bent and gouged, the brown thorns ripped and twisted, and it's dark red petals smashed, bruised and cut till the tops were bald and the floor at it's feet were covered with the remains of it's former glory. He shut the door on that sight, on the heart that had just begun to grow, vowing that he had been right all along; _Love is pain in disguise._ He would die before he would permit it to grow again.

Any tears she might have shed had been bottled up, but they had still left their scars. She had survived three months in this fashion. She took one path to work, he took another to his GR. She had the house, he remained—unsurprisingly-- in his GR, caged like a wild animal. Only when the nights were unbearable did he enter his room in the house, stealing in through the window to get away from the spirits that haunted him outside…

Her life was not blissful by any means, but she could say that she had experienced some manner of peace. Despite the circumstances, she had elected not to resume her relationship with Yamcha, deciding that it was really better overall if she found herself a nice, normal, young man to spend the rest of her days with. Not nearly as exciting, but she'd be a lot more content.

As content as a woman like her would be, at least.

She began to notice, however, that the GR was falling under disrepair as the days went by, and that even the door to Vegeta's room looked unused in forever.

…

Maybe it was time to be civil again?

… _ooh… someone's PMSing, aren't they?_

_Who wants to pet the kitty?_

Review, and you get your name tacked onto the next chapter! Plus, it might inspire me to write faster… *wink wink, nudge nudge*

~*~ Hattiakourri ~*~


	4. Sanctum

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A/N: Okay… Another one down. My apologies for those who may have been waiting on this, but my duties at school and at home are paramount, and so this fiction had to take a back-seat for a while—but it's here now, and will continue to be so. From now on, however, I plan on updating by the dates I set on my profile page. Take a look there.

Thanks go out to my lovely reviewers: **Lhia, ljv, Lilac Owl, Oleandera, hopelessly_demented, and marcaiaah1223**—thanks a bunch. You don't know how much you guys help me get going. But the biggest thanks of all goes to _Dragondrama08_, who is many things-- beta and real-life best friend included. It is because of her that I am comfortable enough with this chapter to post it, so kudos to her.

**Disclaimer:** Don't own DBZ, obviously. But this is a fanfiction website, so shouldn't that make this point moot?

Now that all of that legal crapola has been dealt with, on to the fic.

~*~ Hattiakourri~*~

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Frosty Eyes

**Chapter Four: Sanctum**

"I don't know why, but I feel like I'm losing her, Puar."

The floating blue feline looked up from the clay-caked and sweat-stained jerseys she was stuffing into Yamcha's smelly duffel, knowing exactly whom Yamcha was referring to. "What are you talking about, Yamcha? You have always been with Bulma. You'll always _be_ with Bulma. What's with the defeatist attitude? That's not the Yamcha that I know!"

He couldn't help but smile at the feline's fervor.

"There he is! See, I knew you could do it…" she chimed, but she knew the instant his smile faltered that something was amiss. "What's bothering you?"

He had debated telling her about it, but he wasn't sure if she could understand his concern. _Puar…_She was so faithful, so fully trusting. Nothing in her world could ever be less than perfect, any different from what she saw fit. Recent revelations like this would tear up the eternal optimist in her…

That would be an utter tragedy.

"Don't worry about it, Puar—"

"Stop." The feline suddenly hissed, taking a stern tone with him that he had never heard from her before. "Don't dismiss me like that, Yamcha, not ever again. I asked you what's wrong, don't you dare lie to me and say that it's nothing. I've known you since forever. Don't treat me like a dumb animal-- I deserve _better_." She hurriedly stuffed his soiled jerseys in the bag, cinched it up, and turned to him, her face softening from the oddly stern visage he had been confronted with only moments ago. "What's wrong, Yamcha? Please, tell me…"

Silence reigned while the two best friends headed for his clunker car with the overstuffed duffel in tow. He honestly had no clue as to where to begin, and he'd fallen broodingly quiet as he pulled out of the parking lot, despite the feline's repeated attempts to draw him out of his pensive silence. After a short while, he acquiesced. "I don't know, Puar. I just feel so out of place when I'm with her… like she's…"

"Like she's _what_, Yamcha?"

"I don't know," he moaned, coaxing his old car up to highway speed, his thoughts wandering back to simpler times as he puttered along in the slow lane. "Like she's high society, and I'm—"

"—A charming, talented, fun-loving baseball player," Puar supplied sweetly.

The smile that had worked its way onto his face at her comment was halfhearted.

"I…I just don't feel like I mesh with her anymore. I guess it was fun when we were kids, but… that date last month was a _disaster_, Puar. You weren't there, you didn't see it, but the look she'd had on her face…she looked like she was absolutely miserable the whole time. I feel like _I_ make her miserable."

"That's foolish, Yamcha!"

"I know that, Puar… but that doesn't stop me from feeling that way," the glum human mused, sightlessly staring at the road. "I'll go to some society-thing with her and I'll feel so out of place... They'll be dressed in million-dollar tuxedos, and everyone seems to know that I _rent_ mine, just by looking at me. They'll be talking about gear-head stuff and Pavarotti, and when I chime in, they'll just stare at me like I'm just a fleck of trash…"

The feline squirmed agitatedly in her seat. "Yamcha, that's got to be the dumbest thing I've ever heard you say. You've never cared about those snobs before—Bulma's not like that at all, and besides, if she took anything they said seriously, it would be her loss, not yours. But she's _crazy_ about you. She may get…angry…at you from time to time, but she's _always been_ crazy about you. I can't see that ever changing. "

"That's the thing," he grimaced, pulling up to his apartment and into his assigned parking spot. He had yet to turn the sputtering engine off, and just lingered morosely, conflicted emotions racing through his head like a whirling dervish. A sense of dread and loss thundered around his mind, blistering him with a wave of anxiety that never seemed to ebb. "I don't think she is anymore."

Puar sighed dolefully. Yamcha was normally such a confident, strong young man, but once he was stuck in a rut, it was difficult to get him out of it. She would just have to let him get all of his petulant little worries out, and tell him that everything was going to be fine. "Okay, I'll bite. Say she isn't. What makes you think that?"

Yamcha fell quiet for a moment, thinking back on all of the marvelous times he'd had with her… the adventures, the dates, those simple sunny afternoons when they were both just kids mooning in the sight of first love. That lovely glitter that had bloomed in her gorgeous eyes anytime she saw him…

Hell, at this point, even her conniptions were beautiful. She may be Hell's Fury personified when pissed, but it only meant that she cared…

_She cared._

…

_Did she____still____care?_

…

"She doesn't look at me the same way, Puar. Before, I could see it in her eyes that she loved me. She didn't have to say it. Now, she has to say it twenty times before it sinks in, and even then, it doesn't convince me. I just don't know what to--"

_Wait a minute…_

…

_That was it. The solution to all of this uncertainty was right in front of his face the whole time. _

_Their lives needed to change._

"New plan. We're going back into town."

"What? But Yamcha, we don't have nearly enough quarters in the car to get all your clothes cleaned--"

"Time enough for smelly clothes tomorrow, Puar. I know what I need to do," he softly murmured, his face serene, the expression suffused with a strange, grim acceptance.

"Well, it's about time! Glad to see you've come back to your senses," Puar grinned happily as they thundered back onto the freeway. "Worry lines don't suit you anyway. By the way, you really have got to clean this car out. It smells like smoky fried tacos…"

________________________________________________________________________

The days had grown long and rainy by the time they had decided to put down their weapons and be civil again. After Bulma's emotional explosion in the medical ward several months earlier, the house had turned into something of a demilitarized zone, sending Vegeta into his solitary Sanctum of Rage, while she remained in the lap of lonely luxury. Early on in their disagreement, it had been easy to deal with the sudden detachment from her irate houseguest, but as the days rolled into twilight and the weeks chilled into winter, appearances became hard to keep up, and she began to miss the hell he had brought upon her every day.

Today was the first day of December, and so, juiced on coffee and emotion, she tore down her emotional wall. Part of it, at least—she still had her pride, too. She was willing to be the one that stopped pouting first and behaved like a civilized grown-up again. She wanted things to be the way they were once again.

That was part of the reason that she found herself standing out in front of the GR on that blustery morning, holding two cups of steaming hot coffee, shivering like mad. She had been standing outside of the GR for the better part of twenty minutes now, the morning dew seeping into her prized black peek-toed shoes, dampening her sheer black hose, and sending shivers racing through her whole body. The temperature seemed frigid in the shadows of the thick morning clouds, and the GR sat on the very throne of perpetual shadow, cloaked in chilly morning mists, freezing her to the bone.

_At least her hands were warm._ If someone came out here in another few minutes, they might find her dead as a doornail, but at least the coffee would keep her hands toasty…

After another five minutes of waiting—which was something that Bulma Briefs _did not_ do well-- she stormed up to the exterior emergency control panel, snapped open the metal lid, and flipped the manual disengage switch, all with various colorful overtones of extreme irritation. She stormed up to the unbolted door, ready to fling it open, prepared to give him an earful—

But that didn't happen, seeing as though he wasn't there.

"Okay, you ghoul," she meekly called out into the metal cocoon, filled with an uncharacteristic unease. Such flighty behavior was unlike him. "You can stop hiding, because I need to talk to you."

She waited a few moments to hear the dissenting reply she expected, to hear vituperative words slide off his acrid tongue, to confront the terrifying beast that was his voice. When the demonic echoes failed to resonate within the chamber, she took a step cautiously in. A most curious feeling of dread had suddenly stabbed her in the stomach, and felt like it was trying to pull her heart into her tight throat. Something was amiss, it had to be. It's almost like he's—

_Hiding…?_

No.

_Foolish conjecture._

No matter what happened to him, Vegeta, to his credit, never, _ever_ hid. His very name could be run into the dirt, his body could be beaten until he was barely alive, but he would still have the courage to sleep at night, despite knowing that his demons would descend upon him the minute he closed his eyes. He lived a life of purest hell, and yet still he had faced it all, sneering at the farce that was his _destiny,_ to serve a monster. Nothing she could ever do or say could ever shatter his indomitable spirit. She was only a mere _mortal._

But still… something in him was off, and she knew it. He was a peacock by nature, full of pride and confidence, both of which he used to assuage the pain that roiled violently beneath the surface—and to keep others away. He was a complicated creature, far more so than she had ever given him credit for… but he had been alarmingly absent from her life of late, which only served to fuel her worry.

Talking to her mother had only served to bolster her concern. According to her mother, the eternally effervescent Bunny, his appetite had been alarmingly peckish. He seldom came down to eat with the family anymore, and over the past few weeks (whenever he had joined them) he had failed to clean his plate— hardly out of the ordinary for a human, but it was a death-sentence in the making for a Saiyan, and it was a guaranteed sign that something was seriously wrong with the moody prince.

"…Vegeta? Where _are_ you?"

Her timid voice filled the room in trepidant, fearful ripples. The metallic quality of her own voice mocked her for standing alone in that empty room—_for wasting her time_—and she turned swiftly towards the door. Her hands had nervously clamped down on the door lock when she felt the peculiar, eerily familiar sensation of eyes pinned to her back. A wave of warm, prickly tingles rushed up her spine at a sudden realization—

She wasn't alone after all.

"Vegeta?" She started, shifting her eyes towards her feet. She was sure she couldn't meet his gaze, not yet, not after what had transpired the last time they were in the same room together. She had to find a way to assuage his wounded pride without sacrificing hers…

She forced her quivering lungs to take a deep breath, and forced her mouth, her lips, her vocal cords to give voice to the emotion that had run riotous inside her head for a month.

He didn't say anything. The eyes continued to burn into her back, causing her to shiver despite the fact that she was burning up inside.

She couldn't bear to look at him. He wouldn't start it, she would have to, but it was now or never, and if she wanted any form of peace between them, she would have to bite the bullet and put everything on the line.

Her uneven breaths were the only thing that penetrated the stark silence.

"Vegeta, I have so much to say—"

Nothing. No response. Not even a rumbling growl or a snatch of breath. His eyes were still burning savagely into her back--she could feel the wildfire set her spine ablaze-- but he wouldn't _say_ a word. He wouldn't even deign to present her with an answer.

…

That did it. He just sped all of his chances. She wouldn't _beg_ for him to speak to her again, no fucking sir. If he wanted to play the silent game he could go the hell ahead, and spend the rest of his life alone.

…

_Ha… like he would__** care**__. _

_He'd probably consider it a compliment._

"Okay! You listen, and you listen carefully, you jackass," she hissed, her eyes burning in embarrassment, disappointment, and rage. "I came here because I wanted to talk to you about that whole situation back there, forever and a day ago…"

She paused to wipe her sweaty palms on her skirt to resume her tight white-knuckled grip. Why wouldn't he say anything? It would be so much easier if he just spoke up, right now, and gave her an excuse to leave…

_Please…please, just piss me off, and let me leave. I don't want to do this. _

'I got …_frustrated_… with you because I worry about you. You can snort, you can laugh, you can do anything with that knowledge that you want to, but it's true. You're such an isolationist, and I hate seeing you alone with only your shadow as company." She thought about how sappy that had sounded, like syrupy saccharine to her ears. _Disgusting. __**Weak.**_

_I've seen the look in your eyes before, in the most haunted shades of men._

"It pains me to see you hurt yourself, because you obviously don't care whether or not somebody is there to pick you up when you fall. I'd like to think of myself as your friend—even if you don't return the favor. So, can you stop making it so hard to know you? That's all I want. There. I said it."

Silence.

Something snapped inside of her, Here she was, baring her soul to him, and he uses his silence to cut out her heart, to pare it into a thousand pieces and eat it with empty relish—she had said so much, that she cared about him, that she—

She—

…?

She _what?_

How_ did_ she feel about him? She didn't even know.

It sure as hell wasn't _love_. She could never love a man like _him._

It wasn't _**real**__ friendship_—someone of _his_ ilk could never associate with her set. It would soil her reputation and blacken her hands—and her good name—with the blood he'd spilt. _What she wanted from him was friendship on her terms._

_But if that's not what it was, then what __**was**__ it?_

…

Sympathy.

_Sympathy! _That was it—she could feel it. She cringed every time she saw him drag himself out of the gravity room, bruised, beaten…broken, almost… a living, bleeding thing with a soul that died every minute of every day. Watching him like that made her feel pain, made her very insides turn with guilt—she had been born to a beautiful, serene life, and he existed in a torturous, unending symphony of nightmares.

It was only natural to try to lend him a helping hand. It made her feel better about herself.

_**That**__ is disgusting._

But he blocked her at every turn, every time she tried to help him, to know him—the real him—he gave her his bullets. It was all he knew, but she was tired of letting ignorance be the excuse for everything in his life.

_It was all he knew._

_Bullshit._

_**Change.**_

Her rage exploded at that instant like tempestuous fire, searing the corners of her eyes and racing like lightning through her blood. Her mouth worked of its own volition and she could only watch as her brittle wicker heart caught fire under her smoldering pain.

"Okay! Fine! I _**won't**_ give you that part of me anymore! _I tried_. Vegeta, _**Kami, **_I_** tried**_ to help you, but you slap me in the face with your silence, with your stabbing, _lifeless _eyes! _'Just leave me alone!'_ you _**always **_scream at me--" She stopped to catch a breath, her red-rimmed eyes suffused with a light of madness, her chest hitching, her voice pouring out of her lungs in a wicked screech. "Well, _fine!__** Here you go!**_ _Don't_ talk to me _ever_ again, you pig-headed bastard! Burn in _Hell_, you son of a bitch!"

She wheeled around to deliver a coup de grace, a slap to his face when she noticed something seriously wrong with the situation—

Vegeta wasn't there.

He had never been there.

And suddenly she felt like the world's biggest fool.

_Silly child, emptying your empty little heart into an equally empty room! _

But as she whirled to make a hasty retreat, she caught the glimmer of an eye and the barest hint of movement retreat beyond the staircase.

_She hadn't been alone, after all._

Vegeta was unwell.

He had woken up at the crack of dawn, bathed in cold sweat, a tremulous shaking rattling his bones like an earthquake. His eyelids refused to marshal the strength to stay open—leaving him in a drowsy daze he couldn't conquer. He felt completely leaden, frozen to the core…

Thus he had found himself holed up in his rooms, curled up in a fetal position on his cot, shepherding what little warmth he could gather from the scratchy, thin sheets. The scant warmth lulled him back again to the foggy mists of his hazy dreams, to that damned rose.

_It was growing again, despite his various attempts to smite its sickening essence, to wipe it from the Earth as viciously as it deserved. No matter how harshly he tried to tame the flower, to rend it to pieces, to burn it until nothing remained, it would mend its gashes, sharpen its thorns, and grow back all the stronger. Bold, velvet, beautiful, and terrifying, it swelled and burst forth from its bonds with uncontrollable vigor._

_It refused to __**die**__!_

_And he refused to __**live**__, opting instead to flee from the harridan, and to utterly give in to despair. How could he let himself be swayed so much? What could she possibly have done to make him so brittle, so vulnerable?_

When had the _Prince of Saiyans_ been reduced to shivering, cowering scum? What a disgrace it was to be so hopeless, without semblance of spirit or pride. Only one thing could fix that sort of error-- he had to re-forge his steel bastion, to put himself to back to sleep within its prison, and reclaim his old swagger, his cold, bitter glory.

Training was the only way to resurrect that part of him, the part he thought was dead forever. But training involved an expenditure of _effort_, the strength of will necessary to _force_ his bony ass out of bed, to _force_ himself to beat his body until it was sore, to scald his soul until it was hardy, and to burnish his ki until it shined brighter than anything ever could…

And with that thread of thought burning in his mind, he forced himself back into his routine. He'd donned his training attire, and headed out for the GR, new determination taking root in his head.

He would claim his birthright.

He must.

There was no other purpose. It was his destiny.

…_but what would remain after he claimed his destiny?_

As he leapt from his balcony and approached the machine however, he noticed something quite odd; that snobby, self-righteous, blue-haired twit was stalking away from it, obviously incensed at something, sputtering with poorly-repressed rage. _What was that self-righteous brat doing in __**his**__ chamber?_

He had half-expected there to be a confrontation when he twisted opened the vault door (after all, that silly bitch had to have been yelling at _something)_, but was slightly thankful when his search turned up empty.

_What had she been up to? Had she been rigging it to sabotage my efforts… to kill me?_ _No… she wouldn't try to do that. Even she's not that stupid. That's not even like her anyway._

_No…not her. Never her. Her scent, it smelled of anger, of fear, of…guilt?_

_What had she come here to do?_

It was then that he scented something—the scent of animal fur and musk—and registered the presence of his enigmatic feline companion, now perched casually upon the central console. His gold-flecked eyes pierced his own with a blistering stare, until it flicked its radiant gaze to the surveillance camera above the console column. He caught the strangely intelligent animal's hint, and began delving into the security files.

When he pulled up the video, he was absolutely _frothing_ with rage.

Shortly after her tempestuous rant in the GR, Bulma had stormed back to the house, her strident emotions rolling off of her like toxic gas. Her mood was as black as it had ever been, and her parents, after catching wind of her virulent mood—the sound of shattering drinking glasses in the kitchen had been evidence enough—had deliberately made themselves scarce, leaving their enraged daughter waiting bereft downstairs.

She had plopped down on the sofa wand was stewing in silence and boiling fury when the doorbell began to ring impatiently. At first, she was just going to ignore it, but as it began to ring to a jaunty, unrecognizable tune—_motherfucker on the other side must be awfully happy—_she decided that she needed to claim a victim.

_I would like to give whatever asshole that was repeatedly ringing the doorbell a piece my mind, _the tyrannical heiress fumed, storming towards the door, looking to exact her vengeful fury on the unfortunate soul on the other side. She'd flung it open hard as she could— then she spotted Yamcha on the other side, and her anger fizzled into a restless awkwardness that made her feel sick to her stomach. "_Yamcha?_ What are you—"

"Bulma," he murmured softly, "We need to talk."

"Oh God, Yamcha," Bulma moaned, rubbing her throbbing temples and trying to make sense of her blurring surroundings. "Can't this wait until later?"

_Shittiest day ever, _her mind cried. _Nothing's going right today!_

"No, it can't Bulma. Come on, we'll go in the living room." Bulma found herself being pulled to the living room by an iron-grip that seemed to be faintly trembling. Puzzled at what had brought this confrontation about—though she had her suspicions about the reason—she obeyed the gentle entreaty, following him to the plush living room.

He seemed so dark right now…

_Did something bad happen?_

"Bulma, I have something to say, and it's not gonna be easy"

"Why? What's wrong?" Bulma interrupted, the unease on his face charging up her nerves, dread filling the pit of her stomach. "You can tell me—"

"Bulma, please—don't talk… just listen. Please," the warrior begged desperately. They sat together in uncomfortable silence until he had gathered enough courage to continue. "We have to stop this, Bulma. It's not working—"

"What's not working?" Bulma asked, her voice perfectly calm.

"Us, Bulma. Us. You know it, and I know it… and we can't carry on like this forever. It's a farce, Bulma, and I want to move beyond that. I want to start making a life… and you need to start too. This on-again, off-again bullshit is not helping either of us, and I think it's time to let that go."

"I understand, Yamcha. I feel the same way--"

"I guess what I'm trying to say is…"

"Yes…?" she sighed morosely._ Single again, she mused._

…

"Bulma Briefs…will you marry me?"

Wow… that was actually kind of long…over 4,000 words…

What do you think she's going to say? What's Vegeta going to do? Questions, questions…

Don't worry. Next chapter won't take as long to get out, I promise. I just had to sort out a lot of things.

~*~ Hattiakourri ~*~


End file.
